The Shadowman I: Walking

Being followed while walking alone on an empty street is a common fear of mine and I do not doubt that it is a fear of many others as well. Not limited to just darker hours, I often glance behind my back and I like to be aware of my surroundings. This could be just me liking to know my surroundings but I also believe that it stems from the fact that I am naturally a very paranoid person. There are times where you are convinced that there is someone behind you, only for you to turn around and realize that there isn’t. This feeling adds to the uneasiness. Not only does this feeling occur when I am walking alone, but also doing mundane things throughout the day such as reading or browsing the internet, for example. I was very inspired by the darker themes of Duane Michal’s “The Boogeyman” from his series Sequences. It shows a coat rack coming to life and taking away a sleeping girl. To convey this paranoia and fear in my series, I also used a shadowy figure. When the subject feels like she is being watched, she turns around and notices that no one is there. She will never know what was following her or if she was behind followed in the first place. Was she only imagining it? This could also lead to the idea that we can be frightened by things that we cannot see such as things that may be behind us or things that may lurk in the dark, unseen.